Back to the Future? Global Tensions and the (Proxy?) Dynamics of Local Wars

• In Event: The Influence of Global Dynamics on Local Wars

Abstract

This project started with an attempt to systematically assess the manner in which changes in the international system affect the dynamics of civil wars. In this concluding chapter, I reflect on the findings of contributions to the project. Whereas the extant literature has tended to extrapolate on the basis of a few selective cases, our findings problematize some of these conclusions that have been reached thus far. Whereas proxy wars saw great power interventions in conflict settings at the border between spheres of influence, today’s interventions seem to be happening within spheres of influence. And while the term proxy suggests a principal-agent approach, many of our cases studies underline the extent to which non-state armed actors exercise agency. By moving between the macro and the micro, the research further highlights the importance of narratives in ‘determining’ patterns of intervention but this is not a case of major power narratives being imposed on local wars as much as a situation in which the narrative becomes a resource for global and local actors alike to seize upon and take advantage of. The chapter reflects on the manner in which the field of civil war studies has been shaped by the particular context of the 1990s and it considers the impact that changes in the global context may have on the researchers’ trade.

Author

• Marie-Joelle Zahar, Universite de Montreal